Memories of Grandma Heiller ~ November 23, 1983

David Heiller

Our favorite photo of Grandma Heiller. 
Thank you Jeanne Roster!

THINK OF Α SONG FOR this season, an old favorite, not something that you might hear on a popular radio station. It’s too early for Christmas carols, and there’s no national holiday to sing about. But there is one song that fits Thanksgiving time, and it’s been on my mind this Sunday, November 20, 1983.

“Over the river and through the woods, to grandmother’s house we go. The horse knows the way to carry the sleigh through the white and drifting snow. Over the river and through the woods, oh how the wind doth blow. It bites the nose and chills the toes, as over the ground we go.”

I’m thinking of that song today because I’m thinking of my grandmother, Edna Heiller. She shared many Thanksgivings with her eight children, with her 29 grandchildren, and even these last few years with her 17 great grandchildren. Sometimes she would be the hostess, and we’d all converge on her house, everyone bringing something special—cranberries, hot dish, vegetables, pies (pumpkin and apple). There would be coffee and beer, which the men would drink alternately through the afternoon and long evening. Tables would be zigzagged everywhere, covered with linen taken out for this once-a-year time. Kids would sit in the kitchen, teenagers would sit at their own tables, and the aunts and uncles and young adults would sit at the longest table, along with Grandma.

Grandma didn’t dominate the gathering. She didn’t bustle back and forth, entertaining, cooking, talking all at the same time. That’s something you might see on TV, but not many grandmas are really like that. Grandma was more of a presence. She was there, overseeing things without saying much. Asking if the potatoes were done and all the lumps mashed out. Wondering why Donny was late coming from the farm, but not worrying, having lived on a farm herself most of her life. Telling about some old time when there was a foot of snow on the ground many Thanksgivings ago. Watching the kids, and the grandkids and the great-grandkids, and trying to keep them all straight.

Mostly though, people would come to her at Thanksgiving, especially these later years. They would sit by her because they could talk to her, and she would listen. She seldom judged, and I never heard her condemn anyone, even when others in the family did. She was strong and content, and maybe that’s why people were drawn to her. Maybe that’s why I think she personified Thanksgiving.

Grandma was special to me, just like your grandmother or grandfather is or was probably special to you. I used to ask her questions, lots of questions, often the same ones, when I’d come home from college or work to visit. She was not a great story teller, but maybe that made her more believable. She would not say, “Did I ever tell you about the winter of 1933...?” Instead, I would have to ask her about these things. Then she would tell me. Like the time a rattlesnake bit their neighbor in the arm so they filled him with whiskey while they watched his arm swell up and take on a color just like a diamondback rattler, and the man lived, and the whiskey saved him, and every year his arm swelled up the same time, looked just like a rattler, Or the time at a county fair in the 1930s, during the depression, when a man came by selling ice cream for 10 cents, and they didn’t have 10 cents for the ice cream, not even 10 cents, and grandpa wanted to buy that ice cream so badly.

The only time I ever heard Grandma complain was about eight years ago, when I asked about living alone all these years, since 1953 when grandpa died. She said she didn’t mind, that she wanted to live alone and raise a garden, and not be a burden to anyone. And she did just that, so it must have been true. But she said something else, something on another level. “A mother takes care of her family all her life; but the family can’t take care of the mother.” I’ve never forgotten that, and I don’t think I ever will.

I’m telling all this, and maybe boring you as I do, because you may have a grandparent that’s special to you. You don’t have to go tell her that in words maybe, but I hope you realize it, think about it, and show it. I have in the past, as much as I could, and today I’m thinking it wasn’t enough. Maybe it never is.

Grandma Heiller died this morning.

A little help with the deer this year ~ November 15, 2006

David Heiller

It’s kind of fun to process a deer, and this year was even more enjoyable, thanks to Rosie the dachshund.

Not everyone shares my enthusiasm for cutting up deer. I asked Nathan Hahn how he liked it, because I knew he had shot a deer. His proud mother, fill, had announced it to her coworkers at the Caledonia Argus.

Even Rosie couldn't handle
 this hunk of venison

Nathan replied, rather forcefully, that cutting up deer is not his favorite activity. That came as no surprise. I was 16 years old once.  It's not a chore that most young folks relish.

In fact, Jill chimed in, her family was giving the deer away. The weather was warm, and they didn't know when they would get to it, and they had so much meat already, being Hahns and all.

And that led to me getting a deer that cost me nothing more than a sincere thank you. It was an even better way to acquire a deer than last year, which came at the expense of the bumper of my Honda Civic.

So I took half a day off work on November 10 and brought the deer home. I hung it on a hook in the milkhouse in the barn, using an old hemp rope. Our two big dogs were mildly excited about this temporary visitor, but Rosie was nothing short of obnoxious. She barked and sniffed and ran and whined and dashed in and out, as if this deer was nothing more than an oversized possum.

Finally she worked up the courage to give a tug on the leg of the deer, and just about then the old hemp rope gave way and the deer came crashing down. Rosie somehow avoided getting squashed. She is amazingly quick. But from that point on Rosie wasn’t quite convinced that the deer was dead. That was fine with me, because she kept a safe distance, growling most of the time, while I did the skinning. I didn’t like the idea of stepping on her, or tripping on her while holding a sharp knife.

I got the skin off, then removed the legs, the loins, and all the other meat that I could. It was satisfying work on a warm fall afternoon. Rosie got some of her courage back too. Every so often a scrap of fat would fall on the floor. Then I would have to be quick to pick it up before Rosie raced in to get it. She won more than once.

I put the meat in pans and buckets and carried them into the house, then set up shop again at the kitchen table. It was tedious work, cutting up the meat, sorting it by quality: steaks, stir fry, grind meat. But it felt good, putting up the food. It’s a tradition that the old farm has seen in its Thomford history, and there was plenty of it down in the valley at the old Heiller farm. You think about things like that when you are doing a chore like cutting up meat.

Rosie guarding David's well deserved rest.

Rosie “helped” me with this job too. The other two dogs sat at a respectful distance, but Rosie sat under the table and gobbled up everything that came her way. She even fished a hunk of bone out of the waste bucket. She didn’t get far with it—I managed to pry it from her jaws, which is normally not an easy thing to do. I think she was too full to put up a good fight. She looked more like a water balloon than a dachshund by this time.

The deer is all cut up now, and ready for freezing and grinding. (Mike’s Meats in Eitzen does a fine job of the latter.) The carcass and unused trimmings—most of them, that is—have found a home in the woods, where the coyotes and crows and vultures will do their duty.

It’s a good feeling having meat in the freezer. It goes with the snow that fell last week, and dark days and the coming of winter. Those ancient instincts. That’s why I like processing a deer. And having the help of a little dog isn’t bad either.

I put the meat in pans and buckets and carried them into the house, then set up shop again at the kitchen table. It was tedious work, cutting up the meat, sorting it by quality: steaks, stir fry, grind meat. But it felt good, putting up the food. It’s a tradition that the old farm has seen in its Thomford history, and there was plenty of it down in the valley at the old Heiller farm. You think about things like that when you are doing a chore like cutting up meat.

Go hear the beautiful swan song ~ November 12, 2003

David Heiller

I stopped the car at Heiller Valley on Sunday morning, stepped out, and entered the world of swans.

Malika took these pictures on November 7, 2013.

First the sound hit me. Α swan song. It’s hard to describe, but the first thing that comes to my mind is the scene from the Wizard of Oz when the flying monkeys come swooping in for Dorothy and Toto.

I would wager a fair sum that the sound track from that scene came from a bunch of swans. It sounds like a lot of people laughing and talking, but they aren’t quite human sounds. The sound carries a long way. I can hear it from our new home 1-1/2 miles to the west.

I walked across Highway 26 and down the bank to the railroad tracks. The swans that were close to shore did not like that. I didn’t care. I walked across Highway 26 and down the bank to the railroad tracks. The swans that were close to shore did not like that. I didn’t care. No one else was around, and I wanted a closer look.

They gave it to me as they churned off the water. It took a while for the tundra swans to take off. They pounded the water with their wings, frothing it white with a sound similar to fans at a football game applauding while wearing gloves and mittens. When the swans finally got airborne, darned if they didn’t look like those flying monkeys.

And not just one little group, mind you. But flocks of 50 here, 100 there. Some landing; some circling, some heading toward Wisconsin, and all of them talking at the same time. My nephew John joined me a few minutes later. He saw the sky full of retreating swans. “You did all that?” he asked. “Way to go, Uncle David”

“Thanks,” I replied.

We walked north up the tracks and for a few minutes we were speechless, which is a rare condition for John. The sheer magnitude of the swans was almost beyond words. There were thousands of them, maybe tens of thousands, literally as far as the eye could see, scattered on the broad river like handfuls of popcorn.

Then John started peppering me with questions. He knew I didn’t have the answers, because for one thing, he is smarter than I am. Still, he had to ask. Where did they come from? Where are they heading? How many are there? Are they in other places too? How long will they stay here?

I didn’t have the answers, so I wrote a front page article in this week’s paper about the swans. You can get information on the swans at this website: http://midwest.fws.gov/uppermis­sissippiriver, or by calling 1-800-218-8917.

If you have a chance to see the swans, I highly recommend it. Drive south of Brownsville on Highway 26, and look at the river from Shellhorn on down. You’ll be amazed.

And don’t forget to get out and listen to those flying monkeys.

Saying goodbye to a best friend ~ November 21, 1991

David Heiller

WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 13, 1991: It’s 8:15 a.m. My back is sore from digging Binti’s grave. It’s funny how soft the earth is under 18 inches of snow.

Binti is resting on the rug in front of the refrigerator. She likes that spot, and won’t move, even though it’s hard for us to get things. Back in the old days, we would have made her move, but not lately. She’s had royal treatment lately. After 12½ years, she’s earned it.

Binti and the family the day before we said good bye.

I could write a book about Binti. Most people who have grown old with a dog could. Now it’s the final page. She can’t shake hands anymore, like before when she would almost bowl you over with her big left paw. She can’t hear a sound. She won’t eat, not even canned dog food. I never thought I would buy a dog canned food, but we did for Binti about a month ago, when she started looking so gaunt. Now she won’t even finish a can. About all she can do is wag her tail, and even that is weak, not the old rap-rap-rap that used to echo through the house when we’d stoop to pet her.

Last night, she asked to go outside, and didn’t come back for half an hour. Cindy went looking for her. Ida, our three-year-old collie, acted just like Lassie and took Cindy down the road a piece. Binti was stuck in the ditch, in snow up to her neck. She couldn’t move. Cindy had to haul her out and bring her home. We sat her in front of the woodstove and covered her with two old towels. She still wouldn’t stop shivering.

Binti must be thinking the same thing we are. A snowbank, a veterinarian. Same difference. Her time has come.

WEDNESDAY, NOV. 13, 7 p.m. Doctor Frank Skalko found a tumor in Binti’s liver when we brought her in this afternoon. He felt her abdomen on the stainless steel table in his office, with Cindy and I watching, and said, “You’re making the right decision.”

We said our goodbyes then, Binti resting on the table, trusting in us like she had always done, Cindy and I crying on top of her. “You’ve known her a long time,” Frank said. Neither one of us could answer. Then he shaved a patch on her right leg and gave her an injection, and Binti rolled over on her side and closed her eyes, as if she were falling asleep.

We took her home and buried her in the waiting grave, between two apple trees. Noah wouldn’t come with. Mollie did, but ran home crying when I laid Binti on the snow. We didn’t force them.

Ida sniffed her old mentor up and down. She wagged her tail at first, as if asking Binti to play. Then she sensed that Binti was dead, and her tail stopped wagging, and she watched us lay her friend into the hole and cover her with an old blanket, then with dirt, then with sod.

After supper, we took out all our old photo albums, and found several pictures with Binti. The kids want to bring them to school tomorrow, to show and tell. It’s a good idea.

Binti's first day with us in 1979.

CINDY AND I GOT Binti as a puppy when we first were together, back in August of 1979. She was half Irish setter, half roving farm dog. I had just returned from Morocco, so we named her Binti, which means “my daughter” in Arabic.

She was like a daughter too. We took her everywhere, played with her, took daily walks, brushed her so that her fur shone. People would remark at how beautiful she was. That made us proud.

But she was more than pretty. She had good sense even as a puppy. When the kids came along, she accepted them instantly. She knew she had no choice, but it was more than mere tolerance. She let them scoot after her in their super coups, or pull themselves up using her long ears as handles. She never snapped or growled. When she’d had enough, she would stand up and go to the door, or move to another room. She was so patient and gentle, it always amazed me.

Ever since we moved to the Denham area in 1981, we never tied Binti up. She stayed close to home. Once she got into trouble by going into a neighbor’s yard. He threatened to shoot her. I said I would teach her not to do that. For the next two weeks, we took walks past his place, and I held her collar and told her “No!”

I stopped to see this neighbor a couple weeks later. “You must be chaining your dog,” he said a bit smugly. “I haven’t seen her around.”

“Nope, I just taught her to stay home,” I answered with an inward smile.

We seemed to communicate, Binti and me. When the sun would set and silence lay on the land, we would sit on the deck and gaze together over the field. Once a coyote howled from the woods so loud that we both looked at each other at the same time, with a mixture of fear and wonder.

Binti exploring in the snow.

Every winter, a day would come when I would toss a snowball or two at Binti. She would never run away. Instead, she would sit still and give me a look that said, “How could you throw that snowball at me? ME, YOUR DOG?!?” That would always stop me, and I would pet her and apologize.

It sounds like I’m giving Binti more human qualities than she deserves. Some people do that. I remember a lady when I was a kid who dressed her poodle in a vest in the winter, and would take him to the A&W every noon and buy him a hotdog. Someone ran him over one day, and a hush fell over the town like a person had died.

So I’ll admit to you skeptics that Binti definitely didn’t compare to a person. She was far superior. How many people do you know who trust you and obey you and forgive you, no matter what? Name one.

Is that why they call dog a man’s best friend? I think so.

If I could order a dog, like you order Christmas presents from a catalogue, I would order another Binti. No hesitation. She had a good life. She was a lucky dog. And we were too.

A spunky new addition to the family ~ November 2004

David Heiller

It really wasn’t fair, the way Randi Vick hood-winked me.

She had come to The Argus on Monday, October 11, beaming about a dog that one of her home health care clients needed to give away.

David and Rosie and her cauliflower. Rosie was truly an omnivore

“It’s a miniature dachshund,” Randi said. That caught my ear. My wife, Cindy, and I had been talking just the day before about getting that very breed of dog. My sister Kathy has one that we like, named Willie, and some friends from Duluth who had just visited us have one too, named Peanuts. Miniature dachshunds seem to lend themselves to spunky names like Willie and Peanuts.

So I told Randi to find out more about the dog, how old she was, what she was like, that kind of thing. Randi said yes, she’d do that on Friday, and let me know more.

I told Cindy about it that night. We agreed again that it wouldn’t be a bad idea. We already have two dogs, but one, MacKenzie, is 11-1/2 years old, and is showing her age.

Then we forgot about our dachshund dream until Friday, when Randi pulled out her bag of tricks.

See, Randi didn’t report back ON the dog, she reported back WITH the dog.

Our household of doggies was always
full of delights and surprises.

Her name was Zoey. She had long black hair, which surprised everyone at the office. Most dachshunds are brown with short hair.

Then Zoey pulled out her own bag of tricks. She rolled on her back, she jumped onto laps. She gave everyone a steady, friendly stare, and snuck in a lick or two.

Rosie, queen of the manor.

She ran through the office on legs too short under a body too long. Her tail never stopped wagging. We could not help but smile.

“See why I took her?” Randi asked. It was obvious. This was a special little dog, one that nuzzled into the hearts of four fine newspaper women in about 30 seconds.

Of course, I was not about to melt that easily. It took me at least a minute.

My co-workers all wanted Zoey. Maybe that was one of Randi’s ideas too. But Dawn has a dog, and one is all she can handle. Diana couldn’t take another dog either. Robin’s cat would not allow a canine in the house, even though Robin was so fond of Zoey that she started calling her Stinky Pants, which is the highest of compliments from Robin. Jane said dogs were not allowed inside the Palen farm house.

Rosie

So I took Zoey home that night. First I introduced her to our two dogs. They were not as impressed as I was. I didn’t expect much more though. Dog friendships take a while to develop, that’s the way it ought to be.

Zoey won Cindy over in record time when they met that night. Cindy was slightly surprised—bringing home a dog is not something I do every day, or even every decade. I think I scored some hard-earned husband points on that one.

Cindy’s brother has a dog named Zoey, so we decided to rename her. She is now officially Rosie. That name seemed to jump out as a good one. It has lots of spunk, like Rosie the Riveter, and Rosie Deters, and Rosie Papenfuss.

I know our Rosie will be a good addition to the household. She followed me around as I did chores on Sunday, and found two dead mice and a dead bird in the garage. She proudly brought them to me. I managed to take them from her, but not after a good tug of war. You have to like a dog that doesn’t give up her trophies.

No, it wasn’t fair, the way Randi Vick hood-winked me. But I’m glad she did, and so are Cindy and Rosie.

This song is a must hear for all lovers of dogs, especially of the sausage variety...

Dixie the Tiny Dog by Peter Himmelman

Cynthia's note: After this column was published, the original owner stopped in to see David at the Argus. He told him that The ORIGINAL name of the dog was ROSIE, but the grand-kids insisted it should be Zoey...

Take time to do it right ~ November 23, 1995

David Heiller

My daughter’s room is a mess. I’ve told her time after time to clean it, but she doesn’t do a very good job, at least to my adult standards.

I know what the problem is. It’s two fold. One, she needs a little adult supervision. Someone to help her find the boxes that hold her dishes, someone to help her organize her books and her doll clothes.

Malika was always busy in her bedroom.

Second, she needs time. My time. It will take some time to clean it up right. Her and me and couple hours of time.

Time. It’s something money can’t buy, something we don’t have enough of. And it’s something that is at the bottom of any job well done.

I sometimes find myself rushing from job to job and place to place, especially when there are deadlines like getting a story written before the paper is put to bed on Tuesday. Or getting in firewood before snow and the true onset of winter.

I bet you can name a few deadlines of your own. They are a fact of life, and they have been with us for a long, long time.

That’s what makes it so nice when you can beat the deadlines and take the time to do a job right.

I notice it when I start a new job, especially one of manual labor. No matter what it is, when I first start I am out of sync.

It's sometimes hard to jump right into a job,
unless the job is leaping from bed to bed, I suppose.

Like making firewood. It usually takes a half an hour or so before I get it right. I might stumble over a stump, or not bother to put in ear plugs, or use an axe when I should use a maul. I know in the back of my head that things aren’t quite right. I don’t feel good. It isn’t fun.

Then something clicks. I’m not sure what. If I could bottle it, I’d be rich. You could call it finding the rhythm of the job.

Whatever it is, it makes me slow down a notch, and do those little things that make a job go smoothly. If the chain gets a little dull, I’ll stop and sharpen it instead of getting frustrated with a slower cutting chain. It seems like a waste of time, stopping and sharpening that chain, but it makes the job go better in the long run.

I noticed it tonight when I looked at my daughter’s messy room. I want to yell at her clean it, and she’ll go through the motions of cleaning it for me. But it will look the same tomorrow night, and until I spend some time with her on it.

And probably it will take us a few minutes get into the rhythm of the job. Then we’ll go town, and we’ll do it right, and someday she’ll will do the same thing with her own jobs, and with her own kids.

How do you cope with good behavior? ~ November 9, 1989

David Heiller

The best laid plans of Day Care and Babysitter …

We thought we had The Plan this time. Malika, our four-year-old daughter (sometimes known as Mollie the Hun), had finally reached her limit.

Malika (a.k.a. Mollie) and her magic wand.
Maybe it was magic that made her behave?

Three weeks of not brushing her teeth, of not going potty at the right time or in the right place. Three weeks of throwing her brother’s mouse stamp in the wood stove, of writing with a magic marker on her forehead and on a living room pillow, of doing laps around Marilyn Edin and Becky Lourey in the Oak Lake Church basement.

Three weeks of sending her to bed, of yelling. Three weeks of Cindy and I wondering out loud: “What are we going to do with her?”

We brainstormed ideas. The Rack. Drawing and quartering. Taking her to Joint Powers Board meetings. Making her empty the chamber pot. Nothing clicked. Finally Sunday night, when Mollie ran from one last outstretched toothbrush, Cindy cracked.

“That does it. I’m calling Sarah.”

Mollie knew at once that Cindy was not idling her threats. She started crying, real tears. “No, no, don’t call Sarah.”

Cindy called Sarah.

Sarah was a year or two younger in this photo, 
but she had Mollie's number when she came
that day and that is ALL that mattered.

No, Sarah is not a snaggle-toothed hag from a B-movie clutching a chair in one hand and a whip in the other. She’s something much worse in the eyes of a four-year-old who loves her Day Care; she is a Babysitter. And a good one at that. Above railroading. Street-wise, school-smart, 13 going on 20, like all teenagers these days, yet young enough to remember the tricks of an imposter like Mollie.

So Noah went to Day Care on Monday, and Mollie stayed home with Sarah.

Mollie met us at the door when we came home. Her first words: “Can Sarah stay a little longer?”

“What?” her startled father asked.

“Can Sarah stay a little longer?”

Sarah and Mollie, it turned out, had become best buddies. They had played Maple Town. Read books. Cleaned the play room and her bedroom. Brought in firewood. Eaten ice cream.

“How’d it go?” I asked Sarah, peering close, looking for bruise marks, trembling hands.

“Fine. She took a nap from 12:30 to 3,” Sarah replied cheerfully. Mollie hasn’t taken a nap in at least a year.

So much for that experiment, I thought. Cindy had a different perception: Mollie had fun with Sarah, yes, but she was good because she wanted to go to Day Care. She took a nap because she knew that was the only way she could cope with being so good.

(How do YOU cope with being good? There’s a pleasant dilemma. Maybe we should all take more naps.)

Cindy may be right. Just now, Mollie has come downstairs to demand that we rub her back, a nightly ritual before she falls asleep.

Reading and back-rubs, all part of the deal at bedtime.

“If you don’t come and rub my back, you know what will happen? You will rub my back forever!” she hollers.

If ever there was a living Hell...

“We’re going to need a babysitter tomorrow?” Cindy asks her.

“No!”

“Then get to bed now.”

Mollie runs upstairs, bangs her feet on her window. “Tell Daddy to rub my back,” she resumes.

“Go rub her back,” Cindy tells me.

“Why don’t you?” I ask, not looking up from the computer.

“Because when I put her to bed, I said, ‘I’m going to rub your back now,’ and she didn’t want me to, so I said, ‘If I don’t rub your back now, I’m not going to rub it,’ and she said fine. You didn’t make that deal with her.”

Life with Mollie is a life of deal making. “Rub my back, Dad.”

There’s a lesson in all this, somewhere. I was just going to state it profoundly. But it can wait. Right now, I’d better go rub Mollie’s back.